Rugby Australia, Wallabies on Gilligan's Island, not the real world

After more than 30 years with The Sydney Morning Herald and Fairfax Media in Australia, Greg Growden now writes exclusively online for ESPN. Never afraid to step on toes, you can expect plenty of compelling insight from one of Australia's most renowned writers.

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The All Blacks look almost unstoppable on attack, but the Wallabies aren't helping themselves by playing right into the world champions' hands. Meanwhile, is the neck roll being ruled correctly? Your R2 Rugby Championship review is here.

If Rugby Australia is serious about a productive 2019 World Cup, they must get rid of Michael Cheika and all of his backup coaching and managerial staff now -- Greg Growden writes.

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Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale

A tale of a fateful Bledisloe Cup trip

That started from Sydney

Aboard this enormous ship

The mate was the mighty Hooper man

The Skipper Chek brave and sure

Thirty passengers and hangers-on set sail that day

For a three hour tour

A three hour tour

The All Blacks started getting rough

The Wallabies were tossed

Even with the courage of the fearless crew

The Cup was lost

The Cup was lost

The ship's aground on the shore of this

Uncharted Eden Park

With Hoops

Chek too

The millionaire board and their entourage

The team's movie stars

The Mary Ann's in the pack

Here on Gilligan's Isle

So this is the tale of our castaways

They're here for a long, long time

They'll have to make the best of things,

It's an uphill climb

The first mate Hoops and Chek too

Will do their very best

Relying on Izzy's holy tweets

To make the others comfortable

on this isolated tropic nest.

No mobile phone, no TV lights, no sponsored motor car,

Not a single luxury

Like the barren Australian rugby landscape

It's primitive as can be.

So join us here each week my friends,

You're sure to get a smile,

From 15 stranded Wallabies

Here at Raeleen's Rugby Australiaaaaaaaaaa!*

"For gorsake, stop laughing, this is serious!"

Australia's most famous cartoon is Stan Cross's 1933 depiction of two workers involved in a building construction. There has been a mishap, and one is hanging onto a girder hundreds of metres in the air. His mate, to stop himself from falling, has grabbed onto the other one's trousers, pulling them down to his ankles, and is now looking upwards convulsed with laughter.

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Replace the hanging man's shirt with a Wallabies jersey, and you have the complete picture of the mess Rugby Australia has got itself into - through no fault but its own. Rugby Australia has been caught with its pants down.

We have just witnessed another pathetic, no make that completely humiliating Bledisloe Cup campaign, where in just over a week Australian rugby has been exposed as second rate in so many areas - preparation, motivation, skill level, tactics, player selection, endeavour and application.

And with it died in the wool Australian rugby followers are walking away in their droves.

Sadly many won't come back. There is only so much puerile rubbish sane people can endure, especially as the All Blacks could have easily won by almost 50 points at Eden Park on Saturday night as they had three tries disallowed against a mob rudely awakened from their island resort slumber. And the All Blacks were without four of their leading players: Sonny Bill Williams, Ryan Crotty, Dane Coles and Rieko Ioane.

To add to the stupidity those brainless dolts at Rugby Australia send out an email at 8.30am Sunday morning telling the kiddies to "Give Dad something special for Father's Day! Tickets to the Rugby Championship."

Hey you clowns, the Wallabies have no hope in the Rugby Championship. It's all over. Only a kid who detests his father would even consider buying him Wallaby Test tickets.

Nothing has changed. It has just become far more urgent. The changes should now be even more widespread, as the motives of numerous others on handy salaries at Rugby Australia must also be questioned, because they are not providing value for money.

The debate last week over whether Cheika deserved to go was sadly blunted by those crowding and pushing each other off the media soapbox either being too closely aligned to the national coach, the players, the staff or with the cash-cow known as Rugby Australia.

It turned Monty Pythonish, with those from Rugby Australia's whiz bang high performance unit being wheeled out to vehemently defend Cheika. Wow what a shock. That's like asking Elvis Presley's mum to speak glowingly of her son's version of Love Me Tender.

The focus should be more on what those on the high performance and national coaching advisory panel actually do. Clearly nothing special. They haven't got any results to boast about. And those on the Rugby Australia board who appointed them need to start getting their act together, and stop making decisions to the detriment of the local game.

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What is so bleedingly obvious from those defending Cheika is that mediocrity is now accepted in the Rugby Australia ranks. Being second best is okay. Putting up a bit of an effort is apparently good enough. Getting away with wheeling out feeble excuses is now accepted.

Sorry that is not the real world. Australian sport has thrived on playing above its weight. Why sport is so crucial to our national culture is that this country has so often defied the odds. Our sportspeople inspire and revive our nation. It is expected, no demanded, that Australia are winners. Anyone who thinks otherwise should not be allowed anywhere near an Australian sporting team. So maybe some at Rugby Australia should start thinking of other options.

Then there are those who say that changing the coach a year out from the World Cup is stupid. Maybe these apologists should do a bit of research for a change. Cheika was appointed to the job just over 10 months from the last World Cup.

And since the 2015 World Cup, Cheika's coaching record has been diabolical. Just 14 wins from 34 Tests, a success rate of 41 percent. That is simply unacceptable.

There are numerous able candidates out there who can take over. But you can understand some don't want their names associated with this poisoned position.

Rugby Australia will bob and weave, but ESPN can confirm that in recent weeks they have had discussions with at least two excellent coaching candidates who do know something about success.

Sadly quite a few won't put up their hands or make themselves available because they have no respect for Rugby Australia, which lost its way during the lamentable Bill Pulver era and has not improved one iota since Raelene Castle took over. As one well known and highly successful football coach said last week: "The Wallabies don't need a coach. They need a miracle."

And don't feel sorry for Rugby Australia. They after all are the ones while wasting thousands and thousands of dollars, force the lower ranks to dip into their pockets and pay a player levy. That ranks as close to the most appalling decisions made by any Australian sporting organisation in recent times.

And while they swan around in Rugby Australia's brand spanking new over-the-top offices at Moore Park, justifying why they unnecessarily alienated the west of the country by dumping the Western Force, they wonder why they're on the nose with the dedicated rugby heartland.

Shame on you, Rugby Australia. As your priorities are all wrong, you are in need of a massive clean out.